After 16 years abroad, I moved back to my native Sweden. My husband is Austrian and we met in the US where I lived from 1996-2006, and then we moved to Alp-land aka Austria where we lived til 2013. I am still trying to get over that culture shock.
We have two kids. Vincent, our first born was born on May 12, 2006 with an extra chromosome aka Down syndrome (Translocation 21;21). Edgar was born October 10, 2009, but only 46 chromosomes there.
I admit to thinking it was the end of our world when we got the results of the blood test showing our son had DS, 5 days after Vince was born. I was so wrong! Though everything is not easy, life is a lot of fun! That extra chromosome really did not change much.

I started running again in 2011 and completed my first half marathon in October 2011. In 2012 I completed two half marathons and a handful of other races. Running is now a big part of my life and I run at least five days a week. Both for fun and for peace of mind. I am starting to think a full marathon would be fun. Maybe in 2014...

There are a lot of them too. We had a lot of trouble finding a child friendly, nice optician, but now we have hit the jackpot with that.
Vince eye sight has changed for the better, he no longer crosses his eyes, so no more patching up one eye (which honestly we had been slacking with doing as he seemed to always rip the band aid off, regardless of color, pattern or stickers attached…). He also outgrew his glasses:
These are the ones we got in January (when he apparently already had started that finger chewing).

The optician, like last time, ordered a lot of frames we would consider and she called me today and said they had gotten them. If we do not like any we do not have to purchase any of them. I looked at them and three frames I liked, and I could take all three of them with me home. No deposit necessary, she just gave them to me in a bag and told me to tell Vince Hello.

This time we had an other lady helping us than the first time, but this one was just as nice. Believe me, customer service is not something that is generally valued very high in Austria. So this is a firm that is going above and beyond to help. Keep in mind also that Vince does not like trying glasses or being in that type of environment at all. So to us this is worth a million with the help we are getting.

There are a lot of things that really are not fun or pleasant with Down syndrome. For me, the hardest is blood testing every six month to check for gluten, thyroid and the big scary C (Leukemia, which I read is 20 times more likely to occur in children with DS than children without DS, however on the brighter side of that is that somehow children with DS have a higher percentage survival rate than children without DS when it comes to Leukemia).
Back to the point. Since Vincent was diagnosed with DS and I thought my world broke down in to a world of never-laugh-again and never-have -a-fun-moment-in-my- life-again, things have only gone up. The people you connect with, the re-evaluation of what really matters in life and how great some people really are to fight the fights for my family and others, that is an experience I am considering myself lucky to have!

And we do blood every year, with this being the first actual year long period. Before age 4 we did 6 months, too, sometimes more frequently depending on what was happening. Thank goodness for the ONE person that we found at Children’s that we insist on having every time we need a draw. She’s an angel! Since she can get her in one stick, the 30 min drive is totally worth.